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If this were a game that didn't have a lore to begin with, I wouldn't have as much of an issue. If this game were basically just a sport, I wouldn't have an issue either. Not every game has lore in it, but that doesn't necessarily make them bad (see Super Hexagon, Running with Rifles, millions of other games...). Sometimes a story isn't required, and this is especially true for wacky arcade games like Pacman or Dig Dug or anything of the sort.
What I am mad about is that we had a lore, and Riot just threw it all away and replaced it with nothing but a humongous plot hole, and they expect to fill it with silence.
In the above scenarios, I wouldn't have had an issue, but I also wouldn't have been interested, either. The ENTIRE reason I even considered continuing this game was because of its lore. When I had to grind through levels 20-29 with the most toxic remains of human civilization, I started to lose my patience. I was tired of death threats, assholes, feeders, smurfs, and the Dunning-Kruger Effect. I would have completely given up on the game if I wasn't fond of one very particular character.
Teemo.
I didn't like Teemo as a ball of stats, or a poison DoT marksman/burst APC, or a troll pick, or line of code in a video game, or even the Satan that he's been known as frequently. I liked him as a character. I liked his appearance, I liked his voice (although I will admit it does start to get a bit annoying), but most importantly, I liked the lore behind him. He wasn't just a standard furry character, he was a murderous sociopath with little consideration for life. When I played him, I felt like I was playing a dark, morbid character with a deceptive appearance. I felt like I was a cheery character with an empty heart, only killing because I simply had to end their lives. I wasn't killing for some ultimate motive to end the world, or justice, or anything like that. I was killing because the voices told me to do it, and Teemo is one of few champions that actually strikes me as mentally insane.
It's dark, I know (maybe even suggests that I should see someone about my mentality for playing some of these champs...) but I would not have played if all Teemo's lore said was basically "Teemo is a yordle from Bandle City, who works for the Scouts of the Mothership and is a little bit crazy". Does that sound interesting? No. I might have played him because he was cute-looking, but really I just wouldn't care for him as a person, just as a role and a lane.
Champions should not just be roles and lanes with some moves. Champions shouldn't also just be vague legends, passed down through history as fairy tale. They should be people, larger than life. They should feel like they breathe and move like any other person, not just as graphs and tier lists and win-rates. They need to have thoughts, motives, speech. They can't be static images or one-paragraph essays that only correspond with some abilities.
If Riot and the majority of the playerbase wants League to be a sport instead of a video game, fine. I just won't care to be around if/when it happens.
If Riot retconned Teemo's lore to something of the same quality as of recently, I would probably not care anymore. But they've done it before so many times. Remember Trundle? Or Karma? Skarner? Rammus? Xerath?? Cass!?! When does it end!?!? After the lore retcons of those champs, people were absolutely DEVASTATED. Even today, people actively voice their opinions about how poorly their lores were reworked (and yes, Riot has listened to criticism about lore in the past, namely the representation of Viktor in Jayce's lore being extremely inconsistent with the Viktor we've come to love. So our words are not in complete vain, as they've shown in the past they can listen to us)
There's more to a champion and the world than just champ stats and gameplay on the Fields of Justice strange places where a group of ten people who most likely all hate each other keep joining in teams to beat the shit out of each other as two unknown shopkeepers make massive profit. Riot's had their chances. They've promised a world and storytelling like the old days. But it's been what, 8 months, and we've yet to receive a meaningful response from them, other than they don't want us to discuss with them.
I'm angry about the Great Silence, the ignorance of us, the ignorance of the world of Runeterra, the ignorance of everyone that lives in it, but most importantly, I'm angry that at this point that there is little we can do. I fear we'll be stuck in this perpetual limbo, where nothing happens save for champion releases and occasionally champions completely changing to plastic figurines or overused cliches.
Only reason why this is suddenly exploding again is mostly due to the upcoming release of another interesting character whose lore was written in five minutes and explains literally nothing (not already covered in the teaser) other than the name of the time travel device Ekko uses.
Sorry, this was long, but like many, I am extremely upset by this perpetual loop of silence
But the immersion. It's not there anymore to enjoy